Late Ming Dynasty: Summoning players from Liaodong to support the Ming Dynasty

She completely ignored her companion's astonishment, pushed up her non-existent glasses, pulled out some charcoal sticks and a broken wooden board that she had somehow acquired, and squatted down to sketch rapidly. The overwhelming stench seemed to become a catalyst for her inspiration.

Wang Erniu was leading his men on patrol when he saw the situation. He strode over, his face contorted with rage, and roared, "What are you dawdling for! It's just a few planks of wood, and you still can't get it right?"

Zhou Keke stood up and handed the messy wooden board to Wang Erniu.

"Instructor, I need manpower, at least ten. Also, send me all the lime we can find in town. Oh, and timber, the more the better."

A question mark slowly appeared above Wang Erniu's head.

"What are you trying to do? You don't need this much stuff to build a new outhouse!"

"No, not repair. It's reconstruction." A sacred light shone on Zhou Keke's face. "We're going to build Guangning City's first standard three-compartment septic tank here, achieving solid-liquid separation and anaerobic fermentation, eliminating the spread of pathogens at the source!"

Hearing this string of completely incomprehensible words, Wang Erniu felt as if his brain had been hit by a heavy hammer.

Solid-liquid separation? Anaerobic fermentation?

What the hell is this nonsense?

Looking at the unwavering fanaticism of the female "heavenly soldier" before him, Wang Erniu began to doubt the general's decision for the first time. Was this really reinforcement he had found?

Meanwhile, the arrival of these "heavenly soldiers" threw Guangning City into chaos.

On the western section of the city wall, Shi Dali and a group of players were laboriously carrying heavy stone blocks.

"Damn it, this is so boring! When will this stupid quest ever end!" one player complained.

Shi Dali slammed a rock weighing over a hundred pounds onto the ground and roared in a gruff voice, "What's the use of just talking! Let's make it exciting! Let's start a betting pool and wager merit points! Whoever moves the most in an hour gets half of today's mission reward!"

"Damn, that's a great idea, Meat Bro!"

"Let's do it! Anyone who chickens out is a coward!"

In an instant, the previously listless brick-moving site transformed into a bustling "First Guangning Brick-Moving King Competition." The players roared with excitement, leaving the native soldiers dumbfounded.

Over at the logistics cooks' camp, several players were gathered around an old soldier who was chopping vegetables, grinning and joking.

"Uncle, do you have any hidden cooking methods for our military rations? Like adding some kind of fodder to trigger a special recipe and give you a temporary buff or something?"

The old soldier raised his head, his single eye full of vigilance, and sized up the glib-tongued young man.

"You want to sneak a bite?"

"No way, uncle, I just wanted to contribute to our logistics..."

Before he could finish speaking, the veteran slammed the cleaver he was holding onto the cutting board with a "Duang," grabbed the iron spoon next to him with his other hand, and smashed it down on the player's head without any hesitation.

"Get out of here! If you dare take another step near the kitchen, I'll chop you up!"

The entire city of Guangning, amidst its despairing silence, strangely exuded an atmosphere of...joy.

Chu Ze, through the GM's perspective of the Mountain and River Map, took in everything. He didn't interfere; a playful smile even appeared on his face.

Chaos means vitality.

Creation often arises from chaos.

Just then, a conflict broke out at the latrine construction site.

A thin, white-haired old man, leaning on a bamboo cane and surrounded by several disciples, arrived with a furious expression. It was none other than Li Xunyi, the old Confucian scholar from the city.

"Absurd! Utterly absurd!"

Before he even arrived, his heartbroken and indignant rebuke could already be heard.

"At this time of siege, when soldiers and civilians are starving, you do not think of killing the enemy and serving your country, but instead engage in large-scale construction and filthy things! As the sage said, a gentleman does not use tools! This is merely a strange and frivolous skill; what benefit does it bring to the country!"

He pointed at the blueprints drawn by Zhou Keke, trembling with anger.

The players working nearby stopped and gathered around, eager to see what would happen.

"Oh, the plot has been triggered?"

"Who's this old man? He looks like an elite monster."

Zhou Keke was originally a bit socially awkward, but as soon as she heard someone questioning her expertise, her obsessive-compulsive tendencies and stubbornness immediately kicked in. She stood up, dusted off her hands, and showed no fear whatsoever.

Instead of arguing with Li Xunyi about the meaning of the scriptures, she picked up a piece of charcoal and drew a very simple little figure on the wall next to her.

"Sir, look."

Li Xunyi frowned, wondering what this girl was up to.

"This is a person, and this is what he excreted." Zhou Keke drew a bunch of messy lines again. "In here, there are countless 'insects' that are invisible to the naked eye. They will drift into our water tank with the wind and attach themselves to our dry food."

She pointed to the little figure and continued drawing.

"When people eat these things, the 'worms' will cause trouble in their stomachs, making them sick, vomiting, having diarrhea, and developing a high fever. If one person gets sick, they will infect ten people, and ten people will infect a hundred people. This is what is called a plague."

Li Xunyi was completely bewildered; what "insects"? It was utter nonsense.

He was about to speak in rebuttal when Zhou Keke spoke first.

"The Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic says, 'The sage does not treat illness that has already manifested, but rather prevents it from occurring.' What we are doing now is not creating filth, but rather 'preventing illness before it occurs'! A clean camp reduces the chances of soldiers falling ill. Every sick soldier less means more strength on the city walls. Sir, isn't saving lives and maintaining the soldiers' fighting capacity considered 'doing the right thing'?"

Li Xunyi opened his mouth, but couldn't utter a single word.

He didn't understand what "insects" were, but he understood "plague" and "maintaining fighting strength."

This twisted logic, however, used his most revered medical classics as a starting point, and ultimately focused on the overall situation of city defense, which he cared about most. For a moment, he felt his mind was in complete chaos, and the Confucian classics he had read for decades seemed to have lost their luster.

Seeing the old scholar's utterly shattered worldview, Zhou Keke felt relieved. She turned around, picked up her tools, and shouted to the surrounding players, "What are you looking at! Get to work! Let's get the foundation dug today!"

While reinforcing the city wall, Zhou Keke discovered a new problem. The traditional method of mixing glutinous rice juice with clay not only consumed precious grains but also resulted in slow solidification and questionable strength.

She gazed at the deep craters created by the Later Jin catapults, her mind racing with knowledge from her university lectures: clay, limestone, iron ore powder… calcination…

A bold idea took shape in her mind.

She found an abandoned brick kiln, gathered a few players, and started tinkering.

Chu Ze's GM perspective was fixed on her. When he saw Zhou Keke start experimenting with mixing various mineral powders, a thought struck him.

cement!

These two words exploded in Chu Ze's mind like a thunderclap.

His breath hitched, and his heart pounded wildly as if gripped by an invisible hand.

That wasn't ordinary stone and soil! Clay, limestone, and iron slag abandoned due to war, mixed in with the surrounding area... These things combined and, after being forged at high temperatures, pointed to a miraculous creation hundreds of years ahead of our time!

He initially thought the players' primary role was as fearless, infinitely resurrectable cannon fodder. He overlooked the fact that they came from an era of information overload, and that every seemingly ordinary player might possess fragments of world-changing knowledge!

Chu Ze's fingers tapped unconsciously on the cold table, one tap after another.

The strength of the Guangning city wall directly determined how long it could hold out. And cement meant that in a very short time, it could create an impregnable fortress far beyond the imagination of that era!

This was not merely about defending the city; it was the first cornerstone of his establishment of a new order!

Without hesitation, he immediately immersed his consciousness into the Mountain and River Map.

In the complex GM permissions interface, he quickly created a brand new task template—a guided exploration task.

These tasks are not publicly announced; they are only precisely targeted at specific objectives.

……

Meanwhile, next to an abandoned brick kiln in the west of the city.

"Coco, what are we doing?" A player following Zhou Coco, his face covered in dust, looked at the pile of colorful powder at his feet, completely bewildered. "This is even dirtier than fixing a toilet, and there's not a sound at all."

Another player, squatting on the ground, listlessly tapped a white ore with a stone: "Yeah, Meat Bro and the others are having a brick-moving competition on the city wall, their merit points are going crazy, and we're just playing in the mud here, what's the point?"

Zhou Keke turned a deaf ear.

Like a meticulous chemist, she picked up different colored powders with her fingers, smelled them under her nose, and then stuck out her tongue to dab a tiny bit on them, savoring the bitter taste.

"No, the silicate content is still too low..." she muttered to herself, then looked up and pointed to a patch of red earth not far away. "Go, dig up that soil! And that limestone over there, break it into smaller pieces! Make it powder!"

Several players sighed and were about to get up.

Just then, a soft golden light bloomed in their field of vision without warning.

An old-fashioned scroll slowly unfurled before them.

[Triggering a special exploration quest: 'Lost Arts']

[Quest Description: The great city lord seems to have noticed your extraordinary endeavors. Please follow your lead and attempt to create an adhesive that is far stronger and more durable than mortar and cement.]

[Task Rewards: 50 Merit Points, One City Lord Special Contribution Badge]

Beside the brick kiln, there was a deathly silence.

Those players who were just complaining now had their eyes practically popping out of their sockets!

"Holy shit!"

"A hidden quest! It's a hidden quest!!"

"Fifty merit points! Fifty points just for trying! That's enough to buy a new, undamaged sword!"

"And there's the City Lord's Special Contribution Badge! That's definitely a good item!"

The group of people who were listless just a second ago suddenly jumped up as if they had been injected with chicken blood. The way they looked at Zhou Keke instantly changed from "looking at a weirdo" to "looking at a living Buddha".

"Coco! You're my goddess!"

"Sis! Forget digging up red soil, I'll find a way to get you the stars in the sky if you want!"

"What do you need? Just tell me!"

Seeing her teammates suddenly become incredibly attentive, Zhou Keke was stunned for a moment, then pushed up her glasses, which weren't even on her nose, and couldn't help but smile.

Recognition from the "game's official" source ignited her passion more powerfully than any words.

Her eyes shone with an amazing light as she surveyed the abandoned brick kiln and the "raw materials" scattered around, as if she were looking at a treasure mountain yet to be discovered.

The three-compartment septic tank was just a small test.

Now, the passion of the infrastructure powerhouse is truly beginning to ignite!

At the outhouse construction site in the south of the city, Zhou Keke was directing the workers to dig holes and mark lines, a bustling scene of activity. Under the city wall in the west, the "Brick-Moving King Competition" organized by Shi Dali was even more intense, with roars echoing throughout the city. Spurred by the stakes of merit points, everyone transformed into a strongman.

The entire city of Guangning was bursting with vitality amidst an extremely eerie atmosphere.

However, amidst this bustling scene reminiscent of a "newbie village," danger was already creeping in unnoticed.

Outside the city wall, in the shadows of a deep moat, a Later Jin scout, like a venomous snake, pressed his body completely into the soil, silently crawling towards the base of the city wall, using every inch of shadow.

His task was to conduct a close-up survey of the extent of the damage to the city walls, providing the most accurate intelligence for the next siege.

At this moment, atop the city wall.

A player with the ID "Chasing the Wind" was leaning against the arrow stacks, yawning listlessly.

He was assigned to guard duty, and he watched helplessly as others repaired toilets and carried bricks, their merit points soaring, while his own panel remained a bare "0". He was itching to do the same.

Standing guard is tedious and boring, and the rewards are meager; it's a complete waste of time and energy.

His eyes lit up, and a sly idea popped into his head.

"Brothers! Watch closely! Don't let their noisy work of moving bricks and repairing toilets fool you, I'm going to show you a real pro's skill!"

He shouted at the top of his lungs at the players working below the city wall, successfully attracting everyone's attention.

"Is the streamer going to pull something?"

"Look, look! It's Boss Chasing the Wind! What kind of crazy idea does he have this time?"

Amidst the commotion and laughter, "Wind Chaser" wore a smug smile.

He loosened the coarse cloth belt around his waist, stood tall and proud at the edge of the city wall, and began to relieve himself, oblivious to the vast world outside the city.

"Today, I'm going to test it out for myself! Just how high is this game's touted 100% freedom?"

A golden streak of water traced a perfect parabola in the cold wind, carrying a warm breath as it sprayed down into the trench below.

Just then, the lurking Jin scout cautiously peeked half his head out from the shadows.

next second.

A warm liquid poured over his head.

The scout froze completely.

He instinctively closed his eyes, and an indescribable stench forcefully entered his nostrils, rushing straight to the top of his head.

What is this? Rain?

He slowly opened his eyes and wiped his face.

Sticky and warm.

He looked down at the liquid in his hand, then mechanically looked up at the city wall.

The Ming soldier who was heading in his direction, laughing wildly and shaking his body, was like a demon's brand, instantly etched into his eyes.

What a shame!

A volcanic eruption of rage overwhelmed all his composure and rationality as an elite scout.

I am the most outstanding Bayara of the Great Jin! I have infiltrated Shanhaiguan to gather military intelligence, and I have hunted down Ming scouts alone in the Black Mountain! I endured the stench and cold of the trenches, all to complete the mission assigned by my master!

And now!

I was used as a toilet by a southern dog!

He suddenly pulled his riding bow from behind his back, his muscular arms as steady as a mountain. He drew the bow, nocked the arrow, and completed all the movements in an instant, so fast that only a blur remained.

There was no aiming, only instinct.

Only endless killing intent!

"Whoosh—!"

The trembling of the bowstring transformed into a mournful howl of death.

On the city wall, "Chasing the Wind" abruptly stopped laughing.

His expression was still frozen in that triumphant moment, but his body trembled uncontrollably.

He slowly lowered his head.

A section of the arrow shaft, stained with rusty blood, protruded from his chest.

A bright red number slowly floated above his head.

-120

"Holy crap..."

He only managed to utter two words before his body completely lost its strength. Like a puppet with its strings cut, he fell straight backward, tumbling and plummeting from the city wall, which was more than ten meters high.

"Bang!"

A muffled thud.

The once bustling city walls suddenly fell into an eerie silence.

The laughter of all the players caught in their throats. They stared blankly at the spot where "Wind Chaser" had just stood, and then all craned their necks to look down at the city wall.

The mangled corpse struck everyone's heart like a heavy hammer.

died?

He just...died like that?

One second the guy was joking around and bragging, the next second he was a corpse?

Shi Dali, who was carrying bricks, stopped what he was doing, and Zhou Keke, who was repairing the toilet, also looked up. All eyes were on them.

A cold feeling called "reality" spread wildly up everyone's spine.

Among the crowd, only Wang Han did not look at the corpse.

He shoved aside the people around him and rushed to the city wall. His eyes, behind his black-rimmed glasses, were fixed on the bottomless moat below.

His expression was more solemn than ever before.